Lessons through a lens

A Channel 4 documentary this week claims to expose bad behaviour in inner-city classrooms, caught on hidden cameras. Tony Mooney visits one of its targets and finds a school fearful of the likely damage to its hard-won reputation

A report has called for financial education to be made compulsory in British schools. Photograph: Guardian/Graham Turner

On Thursday night, as part of its current affairs series Dispatches, Channel 4 will show a programme that the makers claim "investigates the quality of education in typical inner-city schools and the problems and pressures that both teachers and pupils face on a day-to-day basis". As part of her research, Alex Dolan, a qualified science teacher, took on supply work at 16 schools in London and Leeds and secretly filmed activities there. Four schools, two in Islington and two in Leeds, feature in the final programme.

One of the Islington schools is Highbury Grove, a purpose-built 1960s comprehensive. For a month (in the other schools, filming took between four and eight days), Dolan covertly took a camera into her classroom and those of other teachers. She has left behind a school that feels demoralised and betrayed by what it considers a distorted portrayal of how it functions.

Truda White, Highbury Grove's headteacher, is scathing about what happened: "The values and beliefs we promote at this school are centred on honesty, integrity and generosity. I will have a hard job explaining to the children that all of these were disregarded by one of their teachers, whether she was temporary or not. We are an open school with nothing to hide and all of us feel betrayed by a fellow colleague who came among us and threw our trust in her back in our faces."

Chameleon Television, which produced the programme, has written to the four school heads telling them that the issues covered will include "classroom disruption and poor pupil discipline, the inspection process and the pressure on schools to improve their comparative listing in examination league tables". The schools have been reassured that the identities of pupils will be protected, but the schools will be named. All four have been given the opportunity to "provide a spokesperson for interview to comment on the issues raised" or to "provide a written statement reflecting the school's position on these matters". None of the schools has been given the opportunity to see the film.

The letter sent to White claimed "fighting between pupils in class and in the corridors was a daily occurrence" when Dolan did her research earlier this year. "Classroom disruption preventing learning and teaching was rife" not just in Dolan's classes but in those of permanent staff.

The programme-makers claim there was no consistently applied behaviour policy at the school and that "one of the reasons that pupils behaved badly was that they knew they could get away with it".

I have not seen the film. But having been the chair of governors at a neighbouring school for the past 16 years, I can say that none of these claims is consistent with my experiences of Highbury Grove, or anecdotal evidence from parents of children at the school. The message from them is that Highbury Grove, with its nearly 1,200 pupils, has improved greatly under the leadership of White, who arrived there five years ago, two years after it started to switch from being boys-only to co-educational.

An Ofsted report in 2002 said it was an effective and improving school and an inspectors' visit to the maths department a year later reported that student behaviour and attitudes were good and discipline was not an issue.

Despite serving one of the most disadvantaged parts of Islington and hav ing 52% of students eligible for free school meals, it was named as one of the 50 fastest improving schools in the country at key stage 3. Perhaps the most revealing statistics come from an anonymous questionnaire filled in by parents last September. On a whole raft of issues, parents registered 90% strong approval.

I approached White about the possibility of verifying or disproving Channel 4's claims for myself and writing about what I found. Without hesitation, she agreed. I could wander around the school and talk to anyone. The only proviso was that I would need to have a minder in the background, because I had not been police checked.

As an ex-headteacher, I knew I needed to talk to children first. Even if they have been told what they should say, it is not difficult to provoke children into indiscretions about their school. With this in mind, I met a group of 13 pupils from years 7 to 10.

Without divulging information about the programme, of which they seemed unaware, I presented the pupils with the allegations. Every one of them seemed shocked when I suggested there might be widespread misbehaviour in the school and that not much action was taken to deal with it. Year 7 pupil Antony Middlebrook questioned the claim that some members of staff felt "senior management at the school weren't doing enough to address the problem of disruption and indiscipline or to set clear parameters for pupils".

"The deputy heads get involved a lot," he said. "They are around the corridors chasing pupils into lessons and there are always teachers on patrol. We need signed passes to be out of lessons."

Mark Feltham, also year 7, added:"If a piece of equipment goes missing in a science lesson, a deputy head is there within minutes trying to find out if it has been stolen and who has got it."

When I suggested that the school's behaviour policy was not clearly understood by pupils or staff, I was met with looks of incredulity. "The policy is in our homework diaries and it is posted around the school," said Joel Edward, a year 9 pupil. "At the beginning of each year, we have long discussions in tutor groups about the policy and how it works," added year 10 pupil Nathan Rosel.

If there is widespread misbehaviour at Highbury Grove, the pupils I talked to were not aware of it. They admitted that there were arguments between pupils and that sometimes tempers became frayed; as Alex Stokes in year 8 observed: "There are occasional fights in the playground, but these are soon broken up by senior teachers."

Channel 4's concerns about Highbury Grove were news to parents, too. Rosie Walden, headteacher of nearby Drayton Park primary, sent her son to the Grove in 1999. He is now doing A-levels at the Islington Consortium. "[He] has never mentioned any disruption in classrooms, although he would occasionally talk about problems in the playground," she said. "We would not have kept him at the school had there been any major problems. The minor ones that have occurred have always been sorted out quickly."

These sentiments were echoed by Emine and Mehmet Giritly, the parents of Cagdas, who is in year 10. "There might have been a problem with violence at the school years ago, but Cagdas has not come across it while he has been here," said Emine.

Dullette Forrester, whose niece Whitney is at the Grove, dismissed claims that staff and pupils were not clear about the behaviour policy. "We as guardians are certainly made aware of what the school is about and what it stands for. The policy highlights the responsibilities of pupils, parents and teachers."

My day in Highbury Grove confirmed what I had been told. I waited in corridors to watch lesson changes. I stood outside lessons to listen for disruptive behaviour in class. I entered classrooms to watch lessons being taught and kept doubling back on myself to make sure people were not just putting on a show. During break times and lunch, I talked to pupils, with my minder at a discreet distance. I kept asking children whether there was widespread disruption in their classes, or fights in the corridors. Unless I visited the school on an atypical day, I can truthfully report that what I saw gave me much pleasure.

Though they had to walk quite a way from one faculty to another, pupils generally arrived at their lessons on time and with a minimum of fuss. Lessons started quickly and a working atmosphere was prevalent. This was especially so in the impact centre, where misbehaving pupils are sent when they disrupt other lessons. At no lesson did I hear any noise I would not expect from a normal group of pupils.

The nearest I got to poor behaviour was in a science lesson, when a 13-year-old boy was being mildly disruptive by seeking attention from his mate when the teacher was talking. When I questioned him, he apologised and explained he had not slept and had not taken his medicine. His teacher later told me he was being treated for attention deficit disorder.

Remarkably, I heard only one swearword all day, from a pupil who muttered "oh shit" about a mistake he had made in his written work.

My questioning of pupils of both sexes and different ethnic backgrounds leads me to believe that the great majority find Highbury Grove safe and enjoyable. A teacher patrol system, with staff in contact by radio, means that when fights do occur, they are dealt with quickly.

So why did Dolan see such a different picture? She was in the school for a month; I was there for only a day. She did her research in the depths of winter; I did mine on a warm summer's day (like some adults, children can be depressed by lack of daylight and become fractious). Dolan was also a supply teacher and, rightly or wrongly, supply teachers are treated differently from other teachers. Schoolchildren like continuity, so they feel let down when their permanent teacher is absent, no matter the reason.

But our views of the school are so different that one has to ask the two questions that were constantly put to me by the staff of Highbury Grove. Did Dolan's teaching abilities affect how she related to pupils and them to her, and did the purpose of her mission alter how she interpreted what she saw? Much has been written about how researchers affect the dynamics of a situation, and this has to be taken into account when viewing Thursday's programme.

Many of the staff believe their school was not randomly selected. Islington is where Tony Blair used to live; he famously turned up his nose at its secondary schools and sent his children elsewhere. It does seem curious that, of all the inner-city schools in London, Islington provided two for the programme. The Channel 4 press office told me that Islington had been targeted because of its improving GCSE results.

"You get used to living in a goldfish bowl in Islington schools," says White, "but you just have to keep working at it for the sake of the children."

Bill Clark, director of school services at CEA@Islington, the private company that provides education services in the borough, says: "Delivering effective teaching in an inner-city school is an extremely demanding task. In our opinion, a person who is engaged in another, conflicting role - such as undercover filming to expose indiscipline in the class - is not in a position to manage a class."

CEA says it intends to report Dolan to the General Teaching Council, which regulates the profession.

A Highbury Grove statement to Dispatches echoes these concerns. "The programme-makers have refused to allow us to see the footage of our school ... before responding, making it extremely difficult to address the issues raised. The undercover journalist has betrayed the confidence and trust that was placed in her, not only by the school's management, but by the individual members of staff who welcomed her as a professional colleague," it reads. "Secret filming of this kind can only offer a highly selective view of the school, coloured by the agenda of the programme-makers. A supply teacher is not a passive observer of events, but an active and highly influential part of the environment being filmed."

For a school that is supposedly handicapped by persistent bad behaviour, Highbury Grove is able to recruit and retain some talented teachers. Nicola Garrard, an English teacher and former researcher at Cambridge University, arrived in 2002.

"I only came to gain some experience before I moved on," she says, "but I have enjoyed it so much I cannot see myself leaving."

David Hatchett is an Oxford maths graduate and was born and brought up not far from the school. "I came here because I was impressed with the diversity and the committed and positive nature of the staff," he says. "I knew the school was going in the right direction and improving the chances of very disadvantaged pupils. Despite the disadvantages, the great majority of children are good and well behaved. There may be boisterousness in corridors, but much of it is play acting and exuberance."

Recognising that some of its children have more profound behavioural needs than might be found in other schools, Highbury Grove has built up facilities to support them and recently won an award for the work it does in its centre.

The improvements are acknowledged by long-serving members of staff. Roger Digby and Brian Clancy, who between them have notched up nearly 50 years at the school, say it is much calmer than it used to be. Digby says: "Gone are the days when pupils are going to do serious damage to each other. Altercations these days are mainly of the cussing variety and easily broken up."

"Attendance, especially in the upper school, has improved markedly in recent years," adds Clancy. "There was often in the past an attendance rate of about 50% in years 10 and 11, but those days are long gone."

The ramifications of Thursday's programme could be serious for Highbury Grove. Parents can be fickle and the slightest whiff of controversy can lead to a fall in numbers applying to a school.

"Those who know the school will just not believe what they see," insists White. "But from what we have been told about the programme, for others it will merely reinforce the stereotype of the inner-city school."

As the school's statement to Dispatches points out: "Next week, the programme makers will move on to another target, and our school, our students and our community will be left to deal with the consequences."

In defence of Dolan

A spokesman for Channel 4 defended the programme and the use of undercover filming. "The film shows that children are being let down and betrayed every day of the week. The programme shows some shockingly bad behaviour, but more worrying is the failure of the inspections system.

We are absolutely satisfied that Alex [Dolan] was doing a very good job. Teaching was her priority every day she was in the school. When you watch the film, she is quite obviously a good teacher." Dolan taught for two years before moving into television, though she "kept her hand in" with supply teaching. "Her experience in supply work led her to want to make this film."